This second feature from British writer-director Joanna Hogg – her first was 2007 ‘s Unrelated – follows another upper-middle class family. It’s a simple premise: mother Patricia (Kate Fahy) and her children, Edward (Thor’s Tom Hiddleston) and Cynthia (Lydia Leonard) gather at their holiday home on Scilly Isle Tresco, to give Edward a send-off before he spends 11 months volunteering in Africa. As the family wait for the father to meet them there, various resentments begin to rise to the surface.
The performances, which seem improvised, are excellent all-round; it feels as if we are eavesdropping or spying on naturally occurring conversations. Every conversation in the film is freighted with tension; an undercurrent of discomfort is always present, and humour is derived from our pained recognition of awkward family relationships. But rather than inviting us to sympathise, Hogg’s formal choices suggest that she’s keen to distance us from the action (taking a cue, perhaps, from European filmmakers such as Michael Haneke). The film is shot mostly indoors with a cool, subdued blue-violet tint, and composed almost entirely of static shots with unblinking long takes, and rarely features close-ups – it’s a little like watching fish swimming around in a tank.
Some will be put off by this dispassionate approach and the unrelentingly slow pace; and there are undeniably longeurs, given the film’s two-hour running time. But that’s crucial to its effect: some scenes are stretched to breaking point, as we’re forced to watch the family sit in interminable silence; and at times like this, the film goes beyond any semblance of entertainment to become something confrontational. Particularly notable is an excruciatingly protracted scene in a restaurant, in which Cynthia, dissatisfied with her starter, sends her food back to the kitchen.
Importantly, the characters outside the family provide something of a counterpoint to this misery. Perhaps the only character drawn with total sympathy is the family’s live-in cook, Rose (Amy Lloyd). She alone is consistently dignified and escapes the film scot-free. More complex is Hogg’s attitude to family friend and painter Christopher (Christopher Baker), whose unwavering happiness and enthusiasm for his craft appears to provide some consolation during the wonderful closing scenes, but whose advice on life and art generally come across as pretentious, vague and essentially meaningless. An easy conclusion is avoided.
Overall Verdict: Essentially a slow two hours of sour family disagreements – kudos to Joanna Hogg for making that into something that feels fresh and compelling.
Special Features:
None
Reviewer: Tom René